Discourse and Urban Development

Abstract

This final chapter proposes a cultural-discursive approach in which urban affairs are viewed holistically as culturally based communicative activity where use of language plays a central role. Accordingly, an empirical case study is conducted on the urban development discourse of Hangzhou, a thriving, historical tourist city on the east coast of China, and with a view to revealing its properties, problems and potentialities. The data are taken from a diversity of urban development projects and practices: mega-events, brandings, public consultations, street posters, tourism websites, etc. Systematic, qualitative analysis and assessment show that the city’s development (discourse) is becoming increasingly democratic, multifarious in intent and form, variably mediated, and congenial to tourism and man-nature harmony. At the same time, however, it is tainted with overriding and fast-shifting business ideologies on the part of urban elites, amongst others.